KRISTALINA GEORGIEVA

EUROPEAN COMMISSION VICE PRESIDENT

European Parliament

Georgieva manages the €1 trillion seven-year EU budget, squeezing it wherever possible to manage emergencies like the refugee crisis. She also sets staff policies that affect the career trajectories of more than 30,000 EU officials, and decides on senior appointments — a role in which she has pushed to double the number of women in senior Commission posts. The soft-spoken Bulgarian was also in the running to lead the United Nations, as the lead Eastern European and female candidate. A top Georgieva aide, the Commission’s Director General for Budget Nadia Calviño, could also make this list.

Click here to return to the full listing of the women who shape Brussels, and click here for an explanation of what this ranking means.

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Ms. Georgieva was a late comer at the selection process for the post of UN Secretary General getting less votes than her compatriot Ms. Bokova. How can you designate her as “lead female and Eastern European candidate”. The minimum that one would expect from POLITICO is that you respect facts and stop acting as a mere public relations / lobbying agency